Review of the Honor 4C Pro smartphone

Play video

To test the “omnivorous” nature of video playback (including support for various codecs, containers and special features, such as subtitles), we used the most common formats, which make up the bulk of the content available on the Internet. Note that for mobile devices it is important to have support for hardware video decoding at the chip level, since it is most often impossible to process modern options using processor cores alone.

According to the testing results, the test subject was not equipped with all the necessary decoders that are needed to fully play most of the most common multimedia files on the network, in this case, audio files. To successfully play them, you will have to resort to the help of a third-party player — for example, MX Player.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDoLkB5XLsM

Further testing of video playback was performed by Alexey Kudryavtsev.

We did not find the MHL interface, like Mobility DisplayPort, in this smartphone, so we had to limit ourselves to testing the output of video files on the screen of the device itself. To do this, we used a set of test files with an arrow and a rectangle moving one division per frame (see

“Methodology for testing video signal playback and display devices. Version 1 (for mobile devices)»). Screenshots with a shutter speed of 1 s helped determine the nature of the output frames of video files with different parameters: the resolution varied (1280 by 720 (720p) and 1920 by 1080 (1080p) pixels) and frame rate (24, 25, 30, 50 and 60 frames/ With). In the tests we used the MX Player video player in the “Hardware” mode. The test results are summarized in the table:

Note: If green ratings are given in both the Evenness and Skips columns, this means that, most likely, when watching films, artifacts caused by uneven alternation and skipping of frames will either not be visible at all, or they will not be visible at all. quantity and visibility will not affect viewing comfort. Red marks indicate possible problems with playback of the corresponding files.

In general, according to the criterion of frame output, the quality of playback of video files on the screen of the smartphone itself is acceptable, since frames (or groups of frames) can be displayed with more or less uniform alternation of intervals and without skipping frames. The only problem with video files at 50 and 60 fps is that they drop multiple frames per second (usually at irregular intervals).

When playing video files with a resolution of 1280 by 720 pixels (720p) on a smartphone screen, the image of the video file itself is displayed exactly along the border of the screen, one to one pixel by pixel, that is, in the original resolution, but the image is cyclically shifted to the left by one pixel. The brightness range displayed on the screen corresponds to the standard range of 16-235 — in the shadows only a couple of shades merge with black, but in the highlights all gradations of shades are displayed.

Battery life

The non-removable battery installed in the Honor 4C Pro has an outstanding capacity of 4000 mAh by any standards. This, of course, adds significant weight to what is essentially a medium-sized smartphone. On the other hand, the device, even with a doubled battery, weighs the same as its predecessor with a 2550 mAh battery.

In any case, the battery life of the smartphone is impressive, if not record-breaking. This is expected, since with a huge battery capacity there is neither a power-hungry large high-resolution screen nor a demanding hardware platform. As a result, the smartphone can easily spend two or even three days without recharging if it is used in the mode familiar to an ordinary person, but even on the busiest days the device will not run out of charge in the evening.

Continuous reading in the FBReader program (with a standard, light theme) at a minimum comfortable brightness level (brightness was set to 100 cd/m²) lasted 22.5 hours until the battery was completely discharged, and when watching videos continuously In high quality (720p) with the same brightness level, the device lasted for a full 13 hours via a home Wi-Fi network. In 3D gaming mode, the smartphone worked for 7 hours.

The smartphone is fully charged in about 3 hours with a current of 1.8 A. In this case, in the first hour the battery is charged to 45%, and the rest of the volume is reached in the remaining time.

Productivity

The hardware platform of Honor 4C Pro is built on the basis of a simple quad-core 64-bit single-chip system (SoC) MediaTek MT6735P. The SoC configuration includes four Cortex-A53 processor cores operating at frequencies up to 1.3 GHz. The Mali-T720 video accelerator is responsible for graphics processing.

The capabilities of the review hero’s hardware platform are limited; it is entry-level; no impressive test results can be expected from it. In practice, it is enough for reliable work in most standard tasks, but it is not intended for demanding games. In Modern Combat 5, there were slowdowns, and they were quite noticeable; in World of Tanks this was better. You can play it anyway if you really want to, but this is not a multimedia solution.

Testing in the latest versions of complex tests AnTuTu and GeekBench 3:

For convenience, we have summarized all the results we obtained when testing the smartphone in the latest versions of popular benchmarks. The table usually adds several other devices from different segments, also tested on similar latest versions of benchmarks (this is done only for a visual assessment of the obtained dry figures).

Testing the graphics subsystem in gaming tests 3DMark, GFXBenchmark, and Bonsai Benchmark:

When testing in 3DMark, the most powerful smartphones now have the ability to run the application in Unlimited mode, where the rendering resolution is fixed at 720p and VSync is disabled (which can cause the speed to rise above 60 fps).

Browser cross-platform tests:

As for benchmarks for assessing the speed of the javascript engine, you should always make allowance for the fact that their results significantly depend on the browser in which they are launched, so the comparison can be truly correct only on the same OS and browsers, and such the opportunity is not always available during testing. For Android OS, we always try to use Google Chrome.

AndroBench memory speed test results:

Screen

Honor 4C Pro is equipped with an IPS touch screen. The physical dimensions of the screen are 62×111 mm, diagonal — 5 inches, resolution — 1280×720 pixels, pixel density is 294 ppi.

The frame around the screen is quite wide: 5 mm on the sides and 15 mm on the top and bottom, but you can’t expect anything else from a budget model.

It’s good that the device received automatic brightness adjustment based on an ambient light sensor; LG devices, for example, do not have this level. Multi-touch technology here allows you to process 5 simultaneous touches. When you bring the smartphone to your ear, the screen is locked using a proximity sensor. The screen cannot be unlocked by double tapping, and operation with gloves is not supported.

A detailed examination using measuring instruments was carried out by the editor of the “Monitors” and “Projectors and TV” sections, Alexey Kudryavtsev. Here is his expert opinion on the screen of the sample under study.

The front surface of the screen is made in the form of a glass plate with a mirror-smooth surface that is scratch-resistant. Judging by the reflection of objects, the anti-glare properties of the screen may be slightly better than those of the Google Nexus 7 (2020) screen (hereinafter simply Nexus 7). For clarity, here is a photo in which a white surface is reflected when the screens are turned off (on the left — Nexus 7, on the right — Huawei Honor 4C Pro, then they can be distinguished by size):

The screen of the Huawei Honor 4C Pro is slightly darker (brightness according to photographs is 107 versus 116 for the Nexus 7). The ghosting of reflected objects in the Huawei Honor 4C Pro screen is very weak, this indicates that there is no air gap between the layers of the screen (more specifically, between the outer glass and the surface of the LCD matrix) (OGS — One Glass Solution type screen).

Due to the smaller number of boundaries (glass-air type) with very different refractive indices, such screens look better in conditions of strong external illumination, but their repair in the case of cracked external glass is much more expensive, since the entire screen has to be replaced. On the outer surface of the screen, apparently, there is a special oleophobic (grease-repellent) coating, but its effectiveness is much worse than that of the Nexus 7. However, fingerprints are still removed a little easier, and appear at a lower speed than in the case of regular glass.

When manually controlling the brightness and displaying the white field in full screen, the maximum brightness value was about 385 cd/m², the minimum was 8 cd/m². The maximum brightness is low, but given the excellent anti-glare properties, readability even on a sunny day outdoors should be at an acceptable level.

In complete darkness, the brightness can be reduced to a comfortable value. There is automatic brightness adjustment based on the light sensor (it is located to the left of the front speaker slot). In automatic mode, as external lighting conditions change, the screen brightness both increases and decreases.

The operation of this function depends on the position of the brightness adjustment slider. If it is at 100%, then in complete darkness the auto-brightness function reduces the brightness to 80 cd/m² (a bit too much), in an office illuminated by artificial light (about 400 lux) it sets it to 260 cd/m² (it could have been lower), in a very bright surroundings (corresponding to lighting on a clear day outdoors, but without direct sunlight — 20,000 lux or a little more), the brightness increases to 385 cd/m² (to the maximum — this is how it should be); if the adjustment is approximately 50%, then the values ​​are as follows:

16, 175 and 385 cd/m² (suitable values), 0% regulator — 8, 33 and 385 cd/m² (the first two values ​​are too low, which is logical). In general, the automatic brightness adjustment function works adequately and allows the user to some extent customize their work to individual requirements. At any brightness level, there is no significant backlight modulation, so there is no screen flicker.

This smartphone uses an IPS type matrix. Microphotographs show typical IPS subpixel structure:

For comparison, you can see the gallery of microphotographs of screens used in mobile technology.

The screen has good viewing angles without significant color shift even when viewing large deviations from perpendicular to the screen and without inverting shades. For comparison, here are photographs in which the same images are displayed on the screens of Huawei Honor 4C Pro and Nexus 7, while the screen brightness is initially set to approximately 200 cd/m², and the color balance on the camera is forced to switch to 6500 K. There is a white field perpendicular to the screens:

Note the good uniformity of brightness and color tone of the white field. And test picture:

The colors on the Huawei Honor 4C Pro screen are a little oversaturated and the color balance is slightly different. As additional tests have shown, an increase in color saturation is achieved by a slight increase in color contrast; a side effect is a decrease in shade gradations closer to pure colors. Now at an angle of approximately 45 degrees to the plane and to the side of the screen:

It can be seen that the colors have not changed much on both screens, but on the Huawei Honor 4C Pro the contrast has decreased to a greater extent due to the strong brightening of blacks and a greater decrease in image brightness. And a white field:

The brightness of the screens at an angle has decreased (at least 5 times, based on the difference in shutter speed), but the screen of the Huawei Honor 4C Pro is noticeably darker. When deviated diagonally, the black field brightens greatly and acquires a reddish tint. The photographs below demonstrate this (the brightness of the white areas in the direction perpendicular to the plane of the screens is the same!):

And from another angle:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RUs_qmojsZY

When viewed perpendicularly, the uniformity of the black field is poor, since closer to the edge the black is noticeably lighter in places:

The contrast (approximately in the center of the screen) is high — about 970:1. Black-white-black response time is 20ms (11ms on, 9ms off). The transition between 25% and 75% gray halftones (based on the numerical value of the color) and back again takes a total of 37 ms. The gamma curve, constructed using 32 points with equal intervals based on the numerical value of the shade of gray, did not reveal any blockage in either the highlights or the shadows.

Color gamut slightly less than sRGB:

The spectra show that the matrix filters mix the components with each other to a moderate extent:

As a result, visually the colors have an almost natural saturation (almost due to increased color contrast). The grayscale balance is good, as the color temperature is not much higher than the standard 6500K, and the deviation from the blackbody spectrum (ΔE) is below 10, which is considered acceptable for a consumer device.

At the same time, color temperature and ΔE change little from hue to hue — this has a positive effect on the visual assessment of color balance. (The darkest areas of the gray scale can be ignored, since color balance there is not very important, and the error in measuring color characteristics at low brightness is large.)

This device has the ability to adjust the color balance by adjusting the warmer-cooler hue.

On the graphs above, the curves are Without corr. correspond to the results without any color balance correction, and the curves Corr. — data obtained after shifting the correction slider to the “warm” side (as in the picture above) to set approximately 6500 K on the white field. It can be seen that the change in balance corresponds to the expected result, since the color temperature has almost become equal to the standard value, but ΔE, unfortunately, has increased, in addition, the spread of parameters has increased, which reduces the value of the correction performed.

To summarize: the screen has a low maximum brightness, but has excellent anti-glare properties, so the device can be used outdoors without any problems, even on a sunny summer day. In complete darkness, the brightness can be reduced to a comfortable level. It is also possible to use a mode with automatic brightness adjustment, which works adequately.

The advantages of the screen include the absence of air gaps in the layers of the screen and flickering, as well as a color gamut close to sRGB and good color balance. The disadvantages are poor uniformity of the black field and low stability of black to the deviation of the gaze from perpendicular to the screen plane.